What Would J. Crew Do?

Flavor of Love

2006-01-11T10:12:00.000-05:00

Flava Flav has a new show and it is the best show ever.

Everything in Its Place

2006-01-10T10:27:00.000-05:00

All the archives have been transferred over, as well as your boring comments.

I Am Going to Jail

2006-01-09T13:34:00.000-05:00

Annoying someone via the Internet is now a federal crime.

Gay Mountain

2006-01-09T10:47:00.000-05:00

The one where I talk about gay mountain.

Pepperz: Open for (Legal) Business!

2006-01-06T14:07:00.001-05:00

Jack Abramoff's outfit this, Jack Abramoff's outfit that.

But what will happen to Signatures?

What Is the Deal, Ugandan Families?

2006-01-06T14:07:00.000-05:00

(npr.org)

Analysis here.

A Three Act "Play" About Little Black Tank and the Stretching Machine

2006-01-06T09:24:00.001-05:00

Act 1: There is a man at your gym who is built like a tank. Like a little black tank. When your gym was closed and you had to go to the gross musclehead gym that smelled like pit, he was there. You always notice him, not just because he is a Little Black Tank, but also because he seems to be a personal trainer for halfway house residents. Every time you see him he is working out with a different fat man. All of the fat men smell like cigarette smoke, and you swear the Mexican one he works out with sometimes is drunk. None of them appear employed or employable.

Act 2: read Act 2 here!

Buy More Worker #3116

2006-01-06T09:24:00.000-05:00

What would really get 2006 off to a good start?

A Worker #3116 jingle!

Calling All You

2006-01-05T14:46:00.000-05:00

Hi Princess,

Have you seen my new diary yet?

That's what I thought.

If You Need Immediate Assistance...

2006-01-05T09:51:00.001-05:00

From: worker3116@gmail.com
To: god@heaven.com
Date: Jan 5, 2006 11:03 AM
Subject: I Am Bored

and depressed.
Please advise.

You are looking at this email and you are thinking "This is a stupid post. It is derivative and uninteresting and this diary in general is stupid, and Worker #3116 is stupid, and I always knew that and I am angry because 2006 sucks." I will not argue with you on any of these points. But here is the part that freaks me out: this email was not bounced back.

Are you logged-in God? It's me, Worker #3116, and you are creeping me the fuck out.

Remember that part in Bruce Almighty when Jim Carey is God instead of Morgan Freeman and then he logs into God's email because apparently in heaven all of your prayers are transferred into an html-ready rich-text email document?

Remember that part where I just admitted to having seen Bruce Almighty?

In Like a Pedro the Lion, Out Like a Band No One Ever Cared About

2006-01-05T09:51:00.000-05:00

(pitchforkmedia.com)

HAHA. This is very reminiscent of the time that China Jet and I saw a listing in the paper for a Ray Bradbury book signing and were both surprised to learn that HE WASN'T ALREADY DEAD!

If a band splits up and nobody cares, were they ever together to begin with?

I'm sure that TW Walsh and David Bazan will both land safely on their feet writing the musical score for some Mel Gibson proselytizing Virgin Mary movie filmed in an archaic Hebraic dialect that even Jesus would have found hard to understand. Or they'll form Creed cover bands. Or they'll just keep doing what they've been doing: sucking.

Pump Up the New Diary

2006-01-04T16:26:00.000-05:00

It is day two at the NEW DIARY and things are going pretty well. We are slowly debugging it and soon it will have very few bugs. Little ones that don't scare anyone where you talk to it like "hello, little bug, want to go outside?" but for computers.

Anyway, you guys need to start acting right and changing up your links and bookmarks and getting this going. What do you think this is? Some kind of joke? This is not any kind of joke. LINK IT UP.

Here is just another reason why the new diary is going to be so great! You need quicktime to understand this reason.

Anarchival

2006-01-04T16:21:00.000-05:00

One of the biggest problems so far with the new diary is that I haven't figured out how to transfer all the old archived stuff from blogger. So that got me thinking about those apocryphal stories you hear of writers who burn the only copy of their treasured manuscript to try and get a fresh start. So I imagined pouring a stiff drink and throwing my computer onto a fire. But then I realized it would have to be my work computer. And I think I'd get in trouble for drinking on the job.

Boss: What the f?
Worker #3116: CLEAN SLATE!
Boss: How will you do your work?
Worker #3116: THE PAST IS AN ILLUSION!
Boss: Put out that fire!
Worker #3116: Why? Are you afraid of what the burning may reveal?
Boss: What are you talking about?
Worker #3116: THE TRUTH!
Boss: You're fired.
Worker #3116: YOU'RE FIRED!

Hopefully I'll be able to get those archives up here soon.

Hot This

2006-01-04T13:15:00.000-05:00

(Washington Post)

Leaving aside for the moment the baseline utter ridiculousness of Hot Lists and the usage of Hot Lists to find the pulse of popular culture (whose heart, as of the last time we checked, was beating steadily to a diwali rhythm, or "riddim"), it is a very bad omen for the rest of 2006 if you are getting your style tips from the Washington Post. No offense, Froomkin. If you are using the Washington Post as your arbiter of cutting-edge trends-to-watch you're probably still into M.I.A. and Paper Denim! HAHAHAHAHA.

Read the rest of this entry...

New Year's Reznorlutions

2006-01-04T10:23:00.000-05:00

Even if, like me, you think that New Year's resolutions are a lot of garbage cooked up by fitness clubs and self-help book publishers to squeeze the entire year's profitability into their Q1 financial reports, it's hard not to spend the first week of January thinking about the next 12 months. Have your priorities changed? What kind of actionable goals do you hope to achieve? Where do you see yourself next year at this time?

Then, on January 7th, you get a myspace friend request from this girl, and you think "Huh, maybe I do need to move down to Tampa Bay and unleash the bloodthirsty black demon of my soul unto the plane of mortals."

Gucci Lip Gloss/Louis Vuitton/And the Boots from Batego Vanetto Cost a Arm

2006-01-03T15:13:00.000-05:00

Top ten brands:

1. Mercedes-Benz
2. Nike
3. Cadillac
4. Bentley
5. Rolls-Royce
6. Hennessy
7. Chevrolet
8. Louis Vuitton/Cristal (tie)
10. AK-47
(cnn.com)

I was very glad this morning to find this list of 2005's top 10 name-dropped products in songs that hit the Billboard Top 20. You can learn a lot from a list like this, too, like that there aren't a lot of references to, say, Brawny brand paper-towels. Just like there aren't a lot of white people on the Billboard Top 20.

I am sorry to see Cadillac drop to number 3 (from a former status as number 1), especially because Nike? Kind of boring, rap. At least be specific, like "Nike Lime-Green Aquasocks" or something. Yes, in 2006 I would like to see "Nike Lime-Green Aquasocks" receive their proper status on this list.

The list also fails to take into account the prominence of generic brand luxury items, like gators and fo-fo's. Surely companies like CVS and Target can explain to you the highly-enticing economics of generic brand items.

Beretta fans will be happy to know that their handgun of choice has made it onto the extended list at #13, but before you get too excited Beretta Heads (that's what cutting edge market researchers call you), I'd like you to remember that Berettas are featured rather prominently in the R. Kelly "Trapped in the Closet" Hip Hopera, and the brand could dramatically lose popularity as early as next year (Need I remind you what happened to Courvoisier after "Pass the Courvoisier" dropped from heavy rotation?)

All in all, though, it was a perfectly good year for product name-dropping. But you know what, rappers? You have a responsibility as role models to your primarily youthful audience. In 2006, let's see a few socially responsible brands make it up there. I'm not saying total overhaul of the tried-and-true favorites, but token gestures in popular culture can often have beneficial effects that far outweigh the time or effort put into making them. So, let's see Trojan brand spermicidal-lubricant condoms in the top 3, and Fair Trade coffee beans somewhere in there?

Word to your mom.

Don't Cry for Yulia, Ukraine

2006-01-03T10:25:00.001-05:00

I don't know about you guys, since you're clearly not into girls, but when I saw this on the New York Times website I was like, "Why is she now leading a fight to bring that government down? WHO CARES? Do you have more pictures of this revolutionary FOX?"

The answer is mostly no.

Where Do We Go From Here?

2006-01-03T10:25:00.000-05:00

Is it just me, or does it seem like it's been the holidays since, like, August? I can't even remember my life before the holidays or the anticipation of approaching holidays. It's going to take some serious readjustment. I've got the equivalent of the bends, but for holidays. Which explains all the puke and exploded joints.

Sean Lennon Update: Still Trimless in 2006

2006-01-03T09:40:00.000-05:00

ALL you lonely hearts club members out there can stop asking us how to get in touch with Sean Lennon. Ever since PAGE SIX ran an item last week in which Lennon half-seriously complained he needs a girlfriend, we've been inundated with e-mails and phone calls from women desperate to date the singer/songwriter son of John Lennon. But while Sean tells us he's very flattered, he says it's unlikely he'll be answering any of the dozens of e-mails we have forwarded to him. Sorry, ladies!
(New York Post)

What a tease. This is confusing to me, though. Why would you publicly humiliate yourself on Page Six and then turn down all the free trim? At least get the free trim. In fact, that is my New Year's resolution: get the free trim.

We Are Going to Burn This Year to the Fucking Ground

2006-01-03T09:02:00.000-05:00

2005-12-29T15:51:00.000-05:00

Byeeee, 2005.

Party Like It's April 29, 1992

2005-12-29T15:24:00.000-05:00

There was a story on NPR last night about a brutal mob beating in Milwaukee. Basically, there was some party in the street and a guy honked to be let through and 30 people dragged him from his car and beat the shit out of him. It was reported that while the beating was taking place, MUSIC WAS TURNED UP.

I've never really been to Milwaukee, although I dated this girl for a little while whose sister was a second assistant cameraman on a really famous indie film called "No Sleep Til Madison." Anyway, for spring break of that year we went to Madison to visit her sister "on set" and then we flew to New York and then we broke up. But the more important part is that we rode through Milwaukee on a shuttle to the airport and I remember thinking that it looked really fun with all of the dirt and factories and raw sewage in the river and I actually thought about moving there for awhile. Now this story makes it into the national conscience and I'm thinking "Fuck, now it's going to be impossible to realize my dream because the yuppies are going to be all over this. Fucking gentrifiers." You know what else sucks? When the girl you're dating has a totally smoking older sister who's actually closer to you in age and is the second assistant cameraman on a really famous indie film called "Just Kidding No One Ever Saw No Sleep Til Madison."

I did like the part of the NPR story, as usual, where no one wanted to talk about the giant African-American elephant partying in the middle of the street and beating up a dude.

Return to ToonWorld1982 Lake

2005-12-29T14:40:00.000-05:00

Earlier today, I wrote a post about the recent discovery of a co-worker's on-line romance-novel-in-progress. An anonymous commenter (my favorite fucking kind!) did some basic google research and then posted a link to the full novel in the comments section. Now, on the one hand, this was a gift, because it let me know that there was too strong of a chance for THE NEANDERTHAL-SLASH-DANIELLE-STEEL-WANNABE WHO CLIPS HIS NAILS IN HIS CUBICLE to discover my discovery, and I was able to take down the post before anything worse happened. On the other hand, something about this reminded me of the toonworld1982 fiasco.

DO I NEED TO REMIND YOU OF THE TOONWORLD1982 FIASCO?

Lunchtimeless

2005-12-29T12:50:00.000-05:00

Worker #3116: OK, let's go.
Clown Coffee: Let's do this.
Worker #3116: Time to make lunch history.

Brush With Death

2005-12-29T10:21:00.000-05:00

What I like about getting my teeth cleaned:

Clean teeth.

What I don't like about getting my teeth cleaned:

Talking about Santa Claus or hearing other people talking about Santa Claus.

When two idle dental hygienists were having a conversation about funny reactions that kids have to Santa Claus, how wonderful it is when kids believe in Santa Claus, and how to convince kids to keep believing in Santa Claus when they actually show a sign of intelligent life and deny his existence, my dental hygienist, who was not idle, could not help but stop doing her job every five seconds to join in. Then she tried to get me involved. "Do you remember when you stopped believing in Santa Claus? It must have occured to me gradually, because I don't remember being shocked or anything." The more boring the conversation, the more excited my hygienist was to participate. At one point, after they had moved from Santa to grocery stores to I do not know what, my hygienist dropped her tools and yelled out "Oh, I thought maybe you had watched something sad on T.V." I'll give them something sad to watch on T.V., but you won't be around to see it. Now pay attention to my teeth!

Then it was polish time. "What flavor do you want? We have mint, cinnamon, orange, bubble gum, tuna salad sandwich, BLT, raw dirt, seaweed, loneliness, cabbage, carrot, smoothie, superman flavored ice cream, cherry, did I say cinnamon?" Gross! Where did all these flavors of tooth polish come from? I am a grown man for Jesus Christ's sake! I have better things to do with my time and brain power than worry about what flavor of tooth polish to use. Superman Flavored Ice Cream, please!

Anyway, successful trip all around. I will see you again in two years, cavity creeps.

Still Waiting: Flying Cars in 2006

2005-12-28T16:03:00.000-05:00

It is time for my predictions for 2006.

I predict:

What I Got I Got to Give It to Anthony Kiedis's Cousin

2005-12-28T15:26:00.000-05:00

When I was younger I saw an MTV interview with Anthony Kiedis where he talked about how he loved taking risks, but that he was also a very sexual being*, and that if you asked him whether he'd rather jump out of an airplane or make out with his girlfriend on the couch he would have a very difficult time answering.

For some reason this has stayed with me, I guess because it is still fun, all these years later, to try and imagine someone saying "Well, let me ask you this: would you rather jump out of an airplane or make out with your girlfriend on the couch?" What kind of question is that? And how are those two even comparable? And why can't you do both? What, is your girlfriend going to dump you if you jump out of the plane? Your girlfriend is jealous of jumping? And why the specificity of the couch? You don't like to make out anywhere else? O' Anthony Kiedis, a man of mystery, whose every phrase raises many more questions than it answers.

Then, when I was fifteen, I was in Arizona and I tried to make out with a girl who claimed to be Anthony Kiedis's cousin. We got under a blanket on a couch, but I could not seal that deal. There was no Arizonafornication for me. But now that I think about it she was probably lying and wasn't even his cousin. She had a liar's eyes. Still, were you to ask me, back then or now, whether I would rather jump out of a plane or make out with Anthony Kiedis's 15 year-old cousin, I would not have Kiedis's difficulty in answering. Hello, couch, I hope you are ready for some abuse.

*I HATE the expression "sexual being" and anyone who uses it. What is wrong with you people (I'm talking to you, John Travolta)? It's very "the lady doth protest too much, methinks," with an undercurrent of an asshole who refers to themselves in the third person. To borrow a phrase, fuck it don't say it.

You Are or Are Not Going to Die This Winter

2005-12-28T11:23:00.000-05:00

Can someone explain the whole bird flu preparedness issue to me? What...what is there to prepare for? Either bird flu comes and kills a bunch of us, or it doesn't come? I'm not really sure how stocking up on Constant Comment tea is going to change that. It's not like you're going to see brown-skinned bird flu on the subway carrying a suspicious looking package. Now, if the government was encouraging everyone to prepare for the psychological trauma of helplessly watching your loved ones die, and seeing huge regions of the world economically devastated by an uncontrollable disease, that's something I can get behind. But they're not saying that, are they? No. "Be prepared."

Prepare this, government.

Mystery Juice

2005-12-28T10:26:00.000-05:00

SEAN Lennon is determined to kick off the New Year with a new girlfriend - and he's asking PAGE SIX to help him find one. "Any girl who is interested must simply be born female and between the ages of 18 and 45," John Lennon's singer/songwriter son, 30, told us. "They must have an IQ above 130 and they must be honest. They must not have any clinical, psychological disorders . . . and a kind heart. Clearly beautiful - but beauty on the inside is more important - but no deformities, third legs, fifth nipples . . . I'm completely alone and I'm completely miserable. So please send your request to [PAGE SIX]." Ladies, we await your responses.
(New York Post)

I had always kind of assumed that his ponytail and lack of personal style—not to mention his solo album: LOOK OUT JAMES IHA!—were the indicators of Sean Lennon's lack of class. But surprise! He's trawling for dates on Page Six, cashing in BIG on his footnote trivia-game-answer celebrity status. "Which of John Lennon's sons was trawling for dates on Page Six?" No, not Julien! I'm sure Yuka must be very proud to count Sean as one of her former paramours. She knows her chicken! Anyway, gross, Sean Lennon. Gross. There is no stinkier perfume than publicly declared desperation published in the yellow press. I am also kind of disturbed by the 18 to 45-year-old age bracket. "You must be old enough to vote, but not necessarily old enough to drink. But pre-menopausal is fine, too. I will fuck your vagina whether it is kind of new or kind of old. I'm not being picky here, okay, but if I find out you lied and you are 46 years old I am going to write an unflattering song about you and play it unannounced at an East Village location. I am so sad. I hope the world reads about my sadness. I suck. I am pathetic. I am a pathetic suck."

Learning Is for Jews!

2005-12-27T16:26:00.000-05:00

(cnn.com)

Is it just me, or is that little scholar wearing a yarmulke? And I have a follow-up:

Is it just me, or is that little Jew kind of young to be earning an advanced degree? And I have a follow-up:

What graduate program makes you come up in front of the class and write on a chalkboard?

Please Sir, May I Have No More

2005-12-27T13:09:00.000-05:00

Despite what you may have heard, Jesus was not killed on a stone table by the White Witch as orcs and minotaurs looked on. So I don't buy all this Aslan=Jesus bullshit.

Show me where there is Turkish Delight in the bible!

But I'll tell you something else that makes me very angry: after Aslan comes back to life he explains that if an innocent soul is willingly killed on the stone table blah blah blah, then not even death can keep him from being alive. Or something. So that means that he knew he was going to be resurrected? SOME SACRIFICE!

Also: fat people, why do you love The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch, and the Boredrobe so much? Here is how fat the woman next to me at the movie was: she spent five minutes loudly futzing with the lid on her two-liter cup of soda so that she could EAT THE ICE.

God, I hated this movie so much. If this is really what Christianity is all about, I declare Jihad. LOTR will lay waste to the infidels.

The War on Christmas: Operation Late Gift

2005-12-27T09:44:00.000-05:00

This was in my mailbox this morning:

"In Honor of [redacted company department name], a gift of love has been given in your name by [redacted co-worker's name].

May this gift of:
a sheep

bring you joy as it brings hope and nourishment to a family in need."

I like the please leave a message for Worker #3116 after the beep voice-over nature of the gift's reveal, but I also like that it will bring me joy as a poor family eats...a sheep? What? WHAT IS THIS CARD? THIS IS WHY I AM GOING TO CONTINUE FIGHTING CHRISTMAS IN THE OFF-SEASON.

Trendwatch 2005

2005-12-27T09:12:00.000-05:00

I just got an email from Herb #3116 suggesting that we invite www.lasnightsparty.com to the New Year's Eve party. You know what that means: Herb #3116 just gave www.lastnightsparty.com the "I'm Rick James!" touch of death.

Look out, Cobrasnake! You're about to get on my stepdad's radar!

Out-of-Office Assistant

2005-12-23T09:00:00.000-05:00

Worker #3116 will be out of the office from Fri. 12/23 until Tue. 12/27. If you need immediate assistance, please contact Santa at figmentofyourimagination@makebelieve.com.

The Year in a Screamshell

2005-12-22T13:39:00.000-05:00

(news.yahoo.com)

Sometimes a picture is worth a thousand hyperlinks.

Where Does He Get Such Wonderful Deltoids?

2005-12-22T11:44:00.000-05:00

There is an article in today's New York Times about an intensive work-out program, CrossFit, that has a lot of doctors worried over its high potential for killing you. Needless to say, I find this work-out very appealing, and I have already visited the website to learn more. Seriously, here are just a few quotations that should make it obvious why this is something that I will be doing in 2006:

"I see pushing my body to the point where the muscles destroy themselves as a huge benefit of CrossFit."

"It can kill you. I've always been completely honest about that."

"If you find the notion of falling off the rings and breaking your neck so foreign to you, then we don't want you in our ranks."

The article points out that this workout program is particularly popular among ex-marines, former SWAT members, and cetra, but here is where I get stuck:

The emphasis is on speed and weight hoisted, not technique. And the importance placed on quantifiable results has attracted hard-charging people like hedge fund managers, former Olympians and scientists.

I'm only going to begrudgingly give you hedge fund managers. Those are mostly just assholes whose lack of ambition has pushed them into a highly lucrative but ultimately soul-killing line of work. They're not hard-driving so much as just driving for lack of a better idea. They live in Jersey, and they have nice cars and homes, but mostly their time is spent remembering the awesome threesomes they used to have in their frat house. But mindless drones can work very hard towards something like physical fitness because a) what else are they going to do with all that time before they die, and b) me look like magazine!

Former Olympians. Check.

Um...SCIENTISTS?

The thought of strong nerds is very funny. Basically I just imagine The Riddler doing 15 sets of 10 dead lifts and then going home to concoct an elaborate revenge against the guy who pantsed him in front of the whole school during his junior high production of Guys and Dolls.

The War on Christmas: Operation Fuck You Worker #3116

2005-12-22T10:39:00.000-05:00

So I got to work today and what was sitting on my keyboard? A Christmas present from my boss? WOW!

A FIVE DOLLAR GIFT CARD TO STARBUCKS!

Look, I love my boss, okay, but what is this? Homeless people give each other better presents. Yesterday I saw a pair of running shoes in the garbage can in the locker room at my gym, and I was trying to figure out what would have to happen for me to refuse to even carry my running shoes home and throw them out there, or give them to charity, and I decided that if I had diarrhea in my shoes then I would just throw them away at the gym. Like, if you took off your shoes but then you realized you totally were going to have diarrhea that second and couldn't make it to the toilet so you just had it in your shoes. But actually if you took those shoes and washed the diarrhea off they would be more valuable than this "gift."

Worker #3116: Thanks, boss.
Boss: You're welcome. Get yourself a little coffee.
Worker #3116: Oh, I'm going to get a big one!
Boss: Right. A venti at least...

I highlight this conversation because it points out my boss's tacit understanding that, yes, she was giving me a large cup of coffee as a Christmas present. And a chocolate covered pretzel. You know, to represent the true dildo-y spirit of office Christmas.

Worker #3116's Top 2 Lists of 2005

2005-12-21T14:13:00.000-05:00

Everyone is posting their Top 10 lists all over the internet. Well fuck that!

a) No one cares what you guys think.
b) 10? I don't need 10, I need two. If you give me a top two, I will listen. More than that and BORING.

Here is Worker #3116's Top 2 Lists of 2005

Top 2 Singles of 2005:

1. Black Eyed Peas - "Don't Phunk with My Heart"
2. Rob Thomas - "Lonely No More"

Top 2 Albums of 2005:

1. Black Eyed Peas - Monkey Business
2. Ashlee Simpson - I Am Me

Top 2 Movies of 2005:

1. National Treasure
2. The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants

Top 2 Books of 2005:

1. The O'Reilly Factor for Kids
2. Girls in Pants: The Third Summer of the Sisterhood

Top 2 TV Shows of 2005:

1. The O'Reilly Factor
2. Extreme Makeover: Home Edition

Top 2 Colors of 2005:

1. Forest Green
2. Light Green

Top 2 Insults of 2005:

1. You're a crap.
2. I hate that you're in my life.

What else do you want to know? I've got a Top 2 on every subject!

Futurelove

2005-12-21T11:24:00.000-05:00

Worker #3116: I hate when you meet someone and you wish you could meet them, like, two years in the future, when they had their shit together. But it's too late, you've already met them.
Clown Coffee: Or 18 years later.
Worker #3116: Gross.

STEVENS SAY DRILL. NO MAKE STEVENS MAD! YOU NO LIKE STEVENS WHEN STEVENS MAD!

2005-12-21T10:43:00.000-05:00

Look, I'm no fashion saint. There are photos from my bar mitzvah party that feature me in pegged jeans, a paisley shirt, and patent-leather shoes WITH METAL TIPS. I've had blue and purple hair. Shit, I've had LONG hair. When I was a freshman in high school I thought it was really funny to wear company shirts, like a Domino's Pizza delivery boy uniform or a t-shirt advertising Klondike bars (this is the same period of my life where I only listened to Kool Oldies on the radio). One day I wore a sombrero to school, I don't know what the fuck was going on. All of that being said, throughout my many years of fashion faux pass-that-dutches, I've never worn an Incredible Hulk tie, much less when I was chairman of the Senate appropriations committee.

STEVENS SMASH REALM OF PUBLIC DECENCY AND ELEVATION OF PUBLIC DISCOURSE. SMASH SMASH SMASH.

Winter Suckstice

2005-12-21T09:38:00.000-05:00

Today is the first day of winter.

So what have the past two months been? Practice?

Don't Forget About the Top Selling Female Artist in History with a Record 15 #1 Singles

2005-12-20T14:46:00.000-05:00

I really like Mariah Carey's new song, "Don't Forget About Us." As a song it basically sucks, and the video's not that good either. Like, what is she doing rolling around inside a soccer goal? And is it really that sexy to see a woman submerged in a swimming pool except for one leg propped up on the edge? My only thought when I see that is "I bet her leg is asleep."

No, what I like about the song is just the basic idea. That somewhere in the world there's this guy who's sitting around with his buddies and the video for this song comes on and one of his buddies is like, "Dude, didn't you used to date her?" And the guy is like "Oh shit! I think you're right. I forgot. Yeah, Mariah. Huh. I wonder what she's been up to."

MTA Sike!

2005-12-20T12:47:00.000-05:00

(New York Times)

Rusty bicycles and old walking shoes? Where do you people work, Sanford and Son's Junkyard?

Oregon Tail

2005-12-20T11:23:00.000-05:00

I just read the expose in the New York Times about kids who make hundreds of thousands of dollars starting their own child porn websites. (Lucky!)

I remember I used to try and make real money at the Oregon Trail trading post, but there was only so much you could get for a barrel of salted pork and a musket. And you could never count on repeat customers because they either got cholera and died, or broke an axle wheel trying to ford a river on the way to meet you.

This is my favorite part of the article:

Or, as an adult who called himself DLW wrote: "Did a sexual predator MAKE them make a site? No. Did they decide to do it for themselves? Yes."

Poor sexual predators! Poor, poor sexual predators! Kids can be so cruel.

You and Me Both, Brother

2005-12-19T14:30:00.000-05:00

(news.yahoo.com)

Wait, deadline? What kind of asshole is this guy?

Miscegikongination

2005-12-19T14:13:00.000-05:00

I seen the most tragically heart-breaking love story of all time last night, The King Kong. So, okay, these guys go to Skull Island, right, which is inhabited by scary cannibals and also King Kong. And then them cannibals take Naomi Watts and say, "Here you go, King Kong, here is Naomi Watts." They put a necklace on her, and then King Kong takes Naomi Watts up into a mountain and she sees on the ground of the mountain a pile of necklaces just like the one she's wearing, littered among some bones. She is very scared because this means that she is not the first girl that King Kong has taken. Then later The King Kong falls in love with her. But he killed all the previous girls.

You see what I'm saying?

The King Kong doesn't like black chicks.

The War on Christmas: Operation Deadbeat Père

2005-12-19T10:21:00.000-05:00

I called Deadbeat Père on Friday to let him know that his only son would be coming to see him on Christmas Eve, after 15 months of barely speaking to him. He returned the call yesterday to let his only son know that he would be TOO DEPRESSED for Christmas.

If you have been following the Deadbeat Père saga, then you know by now that he is, indeed, a fifteen-year-old girl.

My favorite part of this was when he said "I would be terrible company right now." Because, you know, it implies that there are times when he is not terrible company.

Anyhow, Christmas is cancelled, everybody, because a fifty-three-year-old man can't get his shit together. We won.

I Broke Three. I Am Amazing.

2005-12-19T09:38:00.000-05:00

Some Saturdays you wake up hung over from the boring party you went to the night before where you didn't meet anyone and they played "Hey Ya" six times. And some Saturday mornings you wake up and learn how to BREAK CONCRETE SLABS WITH YOUR HAND.

I hate to trade in boring cliches, but it was better than sex. Or at least it made sex seem pedestrian. Even you idiots have sex a couple times a year. Probably.

To borrow a phrase: I felt like God must feel when he breaks concrete slabs with his hand.

The Blind Leading the Blind (Where Here "Blind" Means Either "Handless" or "Faceless")

2005-12-16T16:47:00.000-05:00

(USA Today)

"Hello? Yes, you don't know me. But I am just like you. Well, not just like you. See, I lost my hands. You had your face chewed off by a dog. Still very similar, no? Small world! HA HA HA! Oh, careful of laughing with your face. Sorry. Anyway, I wanted to come and offer you encouragement to...have...okay, I should have maybe written something down before I came. But it's not as bad as you might think! Look at my hands! They almost look like regular hands except for the greenish fold of skin at the wrists where they were grafted on. But look, I hide it with a watch, and with French cuffs! Right. Face. Well, you could...ski mask...but you look beautiful! Yes, that's what I wanted to say, that you are beautiful. And okay, yes, your body is trying to reject your face and you have to take drugs for the rest of your life to try and keep your body from destroying your face. But...you know...I have to take them to, for my hands, and now I can shave again! That is how I have this strong, virile moustache! I am a complete man, just like you will become a complete woman. Other things I can do with my hands: drive, answer the phone, hold the hands of my children. I have five children, how many do you have? Oh. I see. Is there a reason you never had any children? But it doesn't matter, does it? It's not like you need your face to hold someone's hand or shave your legs. Imagine how hard it was for me! And itchy! You got lucky! HA HA HA. Anyway, I just thought it was really important in this difficult time for someone like me, an absolute stranger with a mildly related freak deformity, to come forward and say GOOD LUCK WITH YOUR CRAZY NEW FACE.

Adieu!"

The McCullen:40 oz Camo Malt Liquor(1) Memory Bead (optional)Serve Cold for the First Ten Minutes, Then Progressively Warmer Until Gross

2005-12-16T14:01:00.000-05:00

CHICAGO (AFP) - A jeweler turned drink designer has made a splash in the Chicago bar scene with a new cocktail that costs a whopping 950 dollars.

The Ruby Red is a tangy mix of vodka, champagne, cognac, pomegranate liqueur and orange juice.

And it comes complete with a one-carat, grade-A ruby.

"We kind of were playing with an idea that someone could come in and have something to celebrate and remember the night by," said Pete Gugni, a manager at the trendy Reserve club in downtown Chicago.

Gugni said the club wanted to come up with something more memorable than opening a bottle of champagne.

"That's where the stone comes in - at the end of the night they can take it home."
(news.yahoo.com)

a) Lame. For 950 dollars I expect to be so drunk that when I wake up not only do I have a ruby to remind me of what happened, I've also been transported to Dimension X and put in charge of the Terrordrome.
b) The whole "philosophy" behind this drink reminds me of when I used to hang out downtown with McCullen. He would always want to go into this bead store and buy "memory beads." These he would keep...I don't know...in the pile of dirty laundry on his floor?...to remember and cherish the day by. Not only was this super gay, but it was always on days where we had nothing to do and we were just walking around downtown. It was never, like, on Halloween, or after we got in a fight with a drunk guy. No one was running to Bead Store then. It's just for remembering the boring days. And they were always the cheapest five cent beads. He never bought one of the fancy burnt glass beads from India. I guess he's waiting for something really special to happen downtown during business hours just when he's passing Bead Store and thinks of it to commemorate with one of those gems.
c) It's funny how both Ruby Red drinkers and McCullen use symbolic tokens to cherish memories and alcoholic beverages to erase them.

The Matrix Reloaded: Celebrity Gossip Expansion Pack

2005-12-16T13:06:00.000-05:00

Britney wins online: Britney Spears tops Yahoo's annual buzz index -- the end-of-year list of the most often searched names on the Internet -- for the third time in four years. Spears comes back to the top after losing to "American Idol" last year, proving that even when you're not producing new material, an ill-advised pregnancy and train-wreck marriage can make you a winner. Second on the list is 50 Cent, followed by the Cartoon Network, Mariah Carey, Green Day, Jessica Simpson, Paris Hilton, Eminem, Ciara and Lindsay Lohan.
(salon.com)

It is nice to see that the nerds have carved out some small niche for themselves in a cyber-universe that is looking more and more like it was programmed by the producers of TRL.

Overheard in My Work

2005-12-16T10:51:00.000-05:00

A word to the wise should be sufficient: When you walk by a short guy with creative facial hair wearing a shiny suit in the hallway at your job and you overhear him say "I get creamed everywhere," DON'T meet his gaze. Nothing good will come of it.

Did You Mean: Fight of the Cure?

2005-12-16T09:27:00.000-05:00

At first this got me all excited because I was like, 'FINALLY, some fucking answers.'

Um, but then, like:

And it was followed by an article on Alzheimer's and I don't even know what "during of boredom" means. BOOO WEB MD, YOU STINK AND YOU SUCK.

Update: Still bored.

The War on Christmas: Operation Gang Rape

2005-12-15T13:17:00.000-05:00

For the past two days, various departments have held their holiday parties in the conference room across the hall from our department. For hours on end the crowds gathered keep cheering, laughing, and clapping. It is insane.

Clown Coffee: They're the kind of sounds you would expect to hear at a gang rape.
Worker #3116: ...
Clown Coffee: Or a show.

Um...Hi...I'm...I'm the Senate. I...I Was Just Wondering if You...Oh...Oh, You're Busy. I'm Sorry!

2005-12-15T10:53:00.000-05:00

Senate Is Set to Require Details on Secret Prisons
(New York Times)

It has been a long time since my high school civics class, which was taught by a guy fresh out of college. He was really nice, but he could not maintain any semblance of order among a mixed-grade group of students who was not thoroughly engrossed in learning about our nation's inner workings. I remember two main things about that class:

1. One time a kid was acting out in class and the teacher didn't know what to do and he looked over at me and I shook my head so he kicked the kid out of class.
2. Ti-1000 was in that class before we were friends. I think he was on acid most of the time, and he was always coming in with some new Guv'ner 7" that he bought during lunch.

My point is that maybe I don't really get how things are supposed to work. But I do have a modicum of common sense, so I actually understand bureaucracy. This is a big country, and everyone wants to stick their finger in the pork pie. I have trouble some days deciding what I want for lunch, by myself, much less needing a quorum of 100 people representing 295,734,134 other people about whether I want the meatballs or the baja wrap. So, okay, a spending bill gets all tied up. Fine. BUT THIS?

"The Senate is poised to approve a measure that would require the Bush administration to provide Congress with its most specific and extensive accounting about the secret prison system established by the Central Intelligence Agency to house terrorism suspects."

Poised? You're the motherfucking Senate, and we're talking about an international scandal over serious potential threats to human rights under the auspices of the United States government. You work within a mile of the White House. Why don't you get up out of your fancy red-leather chair and go ask for the information. Why don't you all get your assistants to immediately Blackberry your votes in to the floor saying that "Um, Yeah, we would like to know what is going on. Because, you know, we are the FUCKING SENATE." It's really hard to decide what is more disconcerting, that the government maintains "black sites" for secretly interrogating prisoners of war, or that the government maintains "black sites" for secretly interrogating prisoners of war and the Senate doesn't know about them, or that the government maintains "black sites" for secretly interrogating prisoners of war and the Senate doesn't know about them but is unsure how or even if it should go about asking.

I Have My Doubts About the Lexicological Abilities of Top 40 Hip Hop Artists

2005-12-15T09:40:00.000-05:00

Fed up, I looked up "scrilla" on http://www.urbandictionary.com. It means money. I guess I probably could have figured it out, maybe, but I was too caught up in Paul Wall's constant "scrilla/chinchilla," "scrilla/caterpilla" rhyme schemes to spend any time thinking about it. But so then I wanted to know how they got to scrilla from "cash money." Like, okay "merc" means to kill coming from "mercenary," which I can see. But I've been acrosticizing "scrilla" all morning and I still can't get the jumbled letters to spell out "cash" or "money" or "green" or "paper" or "benjamins." Then I saw this explanation on http://www.urbandictionary.com:

derived from the word scroll, which is how paper used to be used was on a scroll. scroll became scrill, then scrilla.

Am I the only one who reads this and calls "bullshit." You're telling me that E-40 looked up the ancient ways of pounding papyrus and questioned just exactly what was in those merchants' baskets that Jesus so carelessly sent flying across the temple floor? And then you're going to tell me that somehow, I don't know, Busta Rhymes came along and made slight adjustments to the word over time? The man dresses like Cab Calloway on meth.

Next week: "cheddar."

Everybody Hurts

2005-12-15T09:14:00.000-05:00

I think it was when I pointed angrily and yelled FUCK YOU! at the TV last night that I realized maybe drinking 90-proof liquor and watching Project Runway by myself isn't productive behavior.

On the Cumming Edge of Technology

2005-12-14T16:46:00.000-05:00

I saw an ad for Intel's new Centrino technology last night that ended with the question "Want incredible entertainment experiences in your lap?"

Sorry, Intel, but you're going to have to do better than that. I can already get incredible entertainment experiences in my lap out at the Landing Strip by the airport, and it's not going to cost no $900 either.

Penny for My Thoughts

2005-12-14T15:08:00.000-05:00

I'm just sitting here thinking about that part in Showgirls when that black guy approaches Nomi Malone on the dance-floor at a club and asks her to dance, and she's like, "Are you any good?" and he's like "Yeah, I'm good!" And then starts busting all these super-gay moves. And I'm thinking about how gay it is to bust overly fancy moves on the dance-floor, but also how great it is to get all cocky and contentious over how good of a dancer you are. "Yeah, I'm good! Fuck you! DANCE UP IN YOUR FACE! HOW YOU LIKE THIS? YOU LIKE THIS DANCE? FUCK YOU! DANCE! DANCE! NNH! NNH DANCE!"

What are you thinking about?*

*I don't care.

The Hilarious Struggle Against Global Terror Related Activities

2005-12-14T11:39:00.000-05:00

WASHINGTON — A $300 million Pentagon psychological warfare operation includes plans for placing pro-American messages in foreign media outlets without disclosing the U.S. government as the source, one of the military officials in charge of the program says.

Run by psychological warfare experts at the U.S. Special Operations Command, the media campaign is being designed to counter terrorist ideology and sway foreign audiences to support American policies. The military wants to fight the information war against al-Qaeda through newspapers, websites, radio, television and "novelty items" such as T-shirts and bumper stickers.
(USA Today)

Yes that is how the terrorists will be beaten. With witty ringer-tees and "Honk if You Love Freedom!" bumper-stickers. Do you ever get the sense that the government didn't read the book it's supposed to be reporting on, and is just standing up in front of the world making shit up as it goes along? "The War on Terror is...good? It is about...making...freedom...ring? I think...terror...is...bad? Also: A lot of people don't like terror. Thanks."

Seriously, though, "novelty items"? Who is in charge of running this program, Bruce Vilanch?

Lonely Unit

2005-12-14T10:00:00.000-05:00

I had a dream last night that I was at a hotel and in one of the downstairs rooms of the hotel a gang of people including some of my friends and some of the kids on my karate team were about to fight 50 Cent and his posse. I told them I would fight 50 Cent with them, if I could get warmed up first. So I warmed up and then we fought 50 Cent and stuff, and it went pretty well. So then there was a five minute break for everyone to rest and then we fought them again, and we won again. But then during our second break I noticed that a lot of 50 Cent's crew had pulled out their aluminum baseball bats. I told my team that I just was not about to go fighting with some baseball bats. They said that we could take them, and one of my karate buddies reminded me of the weapons training we had done, particularly this move where you strike the shoulder and the forearm at the same time to make the attacker's arm go numb. But still I was like, METAL BATS ARE YOU CRAZY? Anyway, I left and as I walked by the windows of the room the fight sounded really brutal and awful, but as it turns out my friends won, and then everybody was sitting by the pool and 50 Cent and his buddies were like "We weren't really going to hit you with baseball bats, this fight was about honor and respect." But I couldn't sit by the pool because my friends totally ostracized me for not fighting against a weaponized G-Unit.

I hate dreams where your friends get mad at you.

The War on Christmas: Operation the Nuclear War on Christmas

2005-12-14T09:10:00.000-05:00

Another World, Another Time, In the Age of Wonder

2005-12-13T15:45:00.000-05:00

(yahoo.com)

CONTINENT OF AFRICA, SERIOUSLY, WHAT IS UP?! THIS DARK CRYSTAL RE-ENACTMENT SHIT WILL NOT STOP THE SPREAD OF AIDS.

Aniston: on the Front Lines Against Pee-Shyness

2005-12-13T11:27:00.000-05:00

"I won't stop at anything. When it comes to my personal privacy and anyone else's personal privacy, I'll set the precedent. I don't care."
--Jennifer Aniston

Hi, Jennifer Aniston? Um...okay, well, I don't really like using urinals. Like, I can, and I know it's kind of gay to go into the stall, and it's not because I'm worried someone's going to sneak a peak at my junk or anything. I'm just pee-shy. It's this nervous thing, like I have to concentrate extra hard. You know how if you try to sleep next to someone else or in the same room as someone else if you're having a hard time falling asleep how if they are already asleep how it's soooo much harder to fall asleep? Like ten times harder! And then when you think about how tired you are and how you wish you could sleep it makes it even worse because you get all agitated with frustration so that it really feels like maybe you won't ever sleep again? That's what being pee-shy is like. Okay, so I guess I'm feeling like it's kind of a privacy issue, like if I had my own personal bathroom we wouldn't even be talking about this. So, like, could you do whatever it takes to set the precedent for my personal privacy, cuz like you sort of promised. Uh, yeah, this is Worker #3116, sorry, I guess I probably should have said that earlier.

Thanks.
Byeeeee.

You've Got to Be Insane It to Win It

2005-12-13T09:32:00.000-05:00

For the past two weeks the Morning ZOO has been offering a contest to 96th callers. Here is what you win: you get to dress up in some holiday-themed costume (Naughty Mrs. Claus, Black Santa, and Naughty Christmas Tree are three very popular choices), get on a bus with a group of strangers who are also in costume, and go on an all-day pub crawl. AND PEOPLE ARE DESPERATE TO WIN. I was trying to think of a more horrific grand prize, and the best I could come up with was being forced to dress up in a holiday-themed costume (I'd probably go with Naughty Snowman), get on the Event Horizon with a group of strangers who are also in costume, and go on an all-eternity trip to hell. But at least with my grand prize, pictures would NOT be posted on the internet afterwards.

"What Kind of Investor Am I?": A Corporate Casual Quiz

2005-12-12T16:27:00.000-05:00

If you hear a hot tip that stocks in the water industry are going to be the investment wave of the future, do you think to yourself:

a) I'm going to try and buy some stocks in the water industry.
b) HOLY SHIT WHAT IS GOING TO HAPPEN TO WATER?

See comments for results.

The War on Christmas: Operation Lesson Learned

2005-12-12T14:30:00.000-05:00

A few years ago, Worker #3116 offered an olive branch to Deadbeat Père in the form of a Christmas dinner. Deadbeat Père had long foresaken his conversion to Judaism for a more personal spirituality that I like to call alcoholism. Alcoholism and Christmas. Anyway, at first it seemed that perhaps Worker #3116 and Deadbeat Père would find some kind of peaceful ground in the form of a lobster and some wine, but on the Wednesday before Christmas Deadbeat Père called to say that Christmas was cancelled on account of how tired he would be after work. At the time Worker #3116 was appalled by this cowardly shirking of the patriarchal duty of Family Tradition Standard Bearer. But that was a pre-War on Christmas Worker #3116. Like a Motorcycle Diaries Che Guevara, Worker #3116 had to undertake an arduous road trip across South America in a sidecar to realize his true calling in the fight against Christmas. And now, like Deadbeat Père like Deadbeat Fils! And so I say "If Christmas itself stood in my way, I, like Nietzsche, would not hesitate to squish it like a worm."

My friends, it falls upon you to call in tired to Christmas!

The following year would be the Christmas where Deadbeat Père made insulting comments about Worker #3116's family and friends and Worker #3116 told Deadbeat Père to go fuck himself, also known as Fuck You Christmas 2003. FUC was almost immediately followed by My-Father-Left-Me-a-Drunk-Voicemail-at-Three-in-the-Morning-to-Tell-Me-He-Had-Lost-All-Respect-for-Me-Because-He's-a-Pussy-New-Year's-Day-2004. I share these facts with you not to earn your pity or your understanding, but to show you that I am your rightful leader. I have stared Christmas in the eye and I have said "Not today, Christmas!"

They Eat Liberals, You Know

2005-12-12T10:41:00.000-05:00

This editorial in the Washington Post is so not about what I thought it was going to be about.

NYPE

2005-12-12T09:49:00.000-05:00

It was reported on the radio this morning that gold shot up eight dollars last week to $537 an ounce. At first I was amazed that in the Technology Age with falling oil reserves, rapid advancements in bio- and nano-technologies, the ascendancy of the internet, and, of course, a Global Struggle Against Terror Related Activities, we are still trading gold on the stock market. But it was put into perspective when the reporter noted the $3.15 rise in Jangly, Shiny Objects (to $132 an ounce) and a $1.97 rise in Pretty (to $408 an ounce).

You're So Predictable (Woah!)

2005-12-12T09:12:00.000-05:00

Weather Report: I can't believe I haven't gotten sick in Bikram yoga yet.
Worker #3116: Why? Are you kissing sick people in there?
Weather Report: No, because it's so hot. Bacteria thrive in hot weather. They love it.
Worker #3116: Oh, that must be why...nevermind.
Weather Report: What?
Worker #3116: Nothing.
Weather Report: Say it.
Worker #3116: No.
Weather Report: You were going to make an AIDS joke, weren't you?
Worker #3116: ...
Weather Report: I knew it.
Worker #3116: It's very hot in Africa...
Weather Report: I can read your mind.
Worker #3116: So what.

WWJS?

2005-12-09T11:58:00.000-05:00

(cnn.com)

The War on Christmas: Operation Holiday Party

2005-12-09T11:43:00.000-05:00

Today is the annual office holiday party. Let's make it the last. Any suggestions?

So far the best I can come up with is spiking the punch with raw chicken. Christmas would be ruined due to intense gastro-intestinal distress, but my concern is people would just work harder than ever to make next Christmas the best ever. Also: how much chicken would I need to poison the whole department? At least 20 pounds. That's, like, a hundred and fifty dollars. And, the nail in the raw-chicken-spiked-punch-idea coffin: I don't know where to get colorless, odorless, tasteless raw chicken. Anything less, though, and people will suspect!

And After You Get the Door, Make Me a Fucking Sandwich

2005-12-09T07:36:00.000-05:00

Have you ever seen a super hot girl at the gym who was doing the full splits? And as she leaned forward to get her stretch deeper, you could see that her entire back was covered in a tattoo? And when you asked her what her tattoo was she said "Which one?" And in your head you were like "OMG! You are hot to death!" Then she confirmed what you had suspected: that her entire back was covered in a tatt of a stormy solar system with cartoon rockets firing up along the edges.

THIS HAS HAPPENED TO ME.

Whatever, though. One of my advisors in Advanced College told me about a girl he dated once whose entire back was covered in a massive Chicago White Sox tattoo, which sets the hot bar for back tatts pretty high.

This morning I got an email that said this: When Satan is knocking at your door, simply say, "Jesus, could you please get that for me?" I like to picture Satan waiting impatiently at the door after knocking for five minutes, like, "Helloooooo?" And Jesus is all, "Why do I have to get it? You NEVER get the door!" And I'm like, "Shut up, you're ruining Lost."

All Things Bright and Beautiful

2005-12-08T13:23:00.000-05:00

Dear New Orleans,

While many of you have lost your homes this year, we thought it would be a special "treat" for you to get to see the candy home we have built in addition to our regular home. This hand-crafted gingerbread house looks a lot like our home, the White House, which is a gigantic mansion, and which is fine, untouched by hurricanes! It's made of delicous pastries and candies and all kinds of heartwarming goodies costing many thousands of dollars in both materials and the labor of an exclusive pastry chef who we have hired just in case we decide we want some pastries. He doesn't make dinner, we have a Mexican who does that. He just makes cakes, can you believe it? Cake anytime you want! So while you are seeking to rebuild your shattered lives this winter, know that somewhere in America, the greatest country on Earth, is a giant candy house that is probably nicer than the little piece of shit you owned that got destroyed.

Love,
George W. and Laura Bush

Sun Kil Dad

2005-12-08T11:44:00.000-05:00

OUCH! Eber Bronfman, Manhattan DA Robert Morgenthau's campaign manager, is being called a cheater by his wife, Maria, who fired off a mass e-mail Monday night to hundreds of his friends blasting her two-timing husband and his lover, Kathy Hwang.

The e-mail, which contains embarrassing snapshots of a bare-chested Bronfman in a blue silk kimono, reads: "Eben Bronfman is a cheating husband. While Eben is off paying for hotel rooms for his trysts with [Hwang], his daughter is wearing clothing purchased from the Salvation Army."
(New York Post)

HA HA HA. I don't know who these people are, and I don't care. I hope they kill each other. And I LOVE when a cheater gets caught and publicly humiliated. There's a word for it: justice. But I like that the woman writing the incriminating email holds up their daughter's indie rock cred as a sign of the cheater's failure as a father. It is true. My father failed, and look at the kind of crap I wear. I bet you that behind every ironic sweat band and slimming pin-stripe blazer there is a child begging for a stable male role-model. This piece goes on to include the damaging fact that their daughter is into everything Mark Kozelek has done and has been getting temporary tattoos in order to figure out the best placement for the broken heart inside of a shimmering star tattoo based one one of her favorite Threadless designs, which she plans to get the day she turns 18.

Dads suck.

Gayyygle

2005-12-08T10:56:00.000-05:00

(USA Today)

It could just be me, but between the headline and the picture I seriously thought this was an article about some "hot" gay couple mixing it up in Philadelphia or renovating their brownstone or something. I had to read the whole description before I realized it was just those two googleionaires, and the use of the word "sultan" didn't make things any easier.

Dial-a-Cunt

2005-12-08T10:03:00.000-05:00

On Monday, I made an appointment with Professor Chuck Norris to talk about fight night. I just wanted to get some perspective on the event, particularly with someone who knew a lot about self-defense and would be able to assess to what extent I acted appropriately or missed a chance to smash a fool.

Anyway, last night he calls me into his office because "my aunt" called the school wanting to get me a present? He asked if I had an aunt who wants to get me a present. Fuckers, I don't even have an aunt. My uncle is dating this really horrible woman named Ruth who, I mean, I love my uncle very much, but leave Mr. Ed at home thank you. But she's definitely not my aunt. Apparently my uncle married a Playboy bunny once, but it was annulled within a month. I could write a whole diary about my uncle. What is it with uncles that makes them so crazy? I better have a baby before Brother #3116. I don't want to be the crazy uncle to his nerdy spawn. Anyway, so Chuck Norris is explaining that he thought the phone call was odd in light of the fight this weekend, and he said that "the aunt" would not reveal very much about herself, but that he got the sense that she was trying to suss out my skill level, which he did not give. His initial interpretation of the event was that the guy from Saturday was trying to put a case together that I had roughed him up. But I never got his name, and although the cops checked my license, I doubt that they would give my informationi to a drunk dude in handcuffs who just tried to assault me. Then Chuck Norris suggested that maybe the guy's family had gone to the party asking questions, but I don't buy that, either. I don't see my friends giving out my life story to some cracked out lady in a bathrobe and curlers asking impertinent questions at three in the morning. And I don't even think he has a family. He looked like the kind of guy who's no stranger to eating manwich in front of one of the two channels he gets on his homemade wire-hanger rabbit ear antennas. And the intellectual gymnastics it requires to imagine this guy getting on Web TV and googling my name and finding my diary and tracking me down, there's just no way. We're talking about white trash, guys. He is the human equivalent of a golden shower, but without any kind of eroticism, just piss. So the human equivalent of a brown shower. Without ANY KIND OF EROTICISM. Professor Chuck Norris tells me that he doesn't think it's anything to worry about, but that he wanted to let me know because it was strange.

So I'm thinking about it, and I'm like who has the following characteristics:

1. Is a girl
2. Knows I am taking karate at Chuck Norris's Karate School
3. Is crazy

Ha ha. That list is so long. Okay, more:

4. Has the balls to call the school
5. Has some need or desire to hide her identity
6. Has the balls to call the school while hiding her identity

CLASSIC COCONUT!

Ladies, if we have dated but I don't like you, please know that it is still much easier to get my attention with regrettable drunken hook-ups than impersonating non-existent family members and contacting my sensei to inquire about my progress in the martial arts. If you are hot you can probably hold my "attention" anywhere from thirty seconds to up to THREE MINUTES!!!

Cheap

2005-12-08T09:10:00.000-05:00

I'm tired.

Why don't you make a funny joke about Lindsay Lohan covering Cheap Trick?

Pop Quiz

2005-12-07T15:53:00.000-05:00

Which one of these photos depicts a dangerous anti-semite who leveraged a successful acting career to create one of the most insidious documents of evangelical Christian dogma and whose father is a vocal holocaust denier, and which photo depicts an adolescent werewolf?

Bareback Mountin'

2005-12-07T13:40:00.000-05:00

Clown Coffee: Are you going to see Bareback Mountin' this weekend? When it opens wide?
Worker #3116: Ha ha.
Clown Coffee: ...
Worker #3116: ...
Clown Coffee: Oh, it's only playing on five screens.
Worker #3116: I guess it's not opening wide this weekend.
Clown Coffee: No.
Worker #3116: Still tight!

The War on Christmas: Operation Oval

2005-12-07T13:12:00.000-05:00

Bush: I Hate Christmas
(Washington Post)

We've done it! We've secured the highest office in the land. Look out, Christmas! You've been making some pretty powerful enemies over the years, and it's high time those enemies came home to roost. By roost I mean DESTROY CHRISTMAS!

I don't want to give too much ammo to the enemy, but I think I know why this battle is being so easily won. Here's an example:

"Bush 'claims to be a born-again, evangelical Christian. But he sure doesn't act like one,' said Joseph Farah, editor of the conservative Web site WorldNetDaily.com. 'I threw out my White House card as soon as I got it.'"

Oh, I twew out my kwismas cawd. YOU'RE A BIG PUSSY AND YOUR FAGGOT HOLIDAY IS ABOUT TO EXPLODE!

The War on Christmas: Operation Kill the Brooks

2005-12-07T10:00:00.000-05:00

I'd like to run over Randy Brooks, and it wouldn't be with no reindeer, either. It would be with my car. Or a bigger car than my car. Like a truck. Or ultimately a tank.

Plan for Victory

2005-12-07T09:24:00.000-05:00

SHAZZAM!

The War on Christmas: Operation I Still Want Gifts

2005-12-06T16:12:00.000-05:00

In the event that the utter defeat of Christmas is somehow postponed until next year, I want something from here.

Clown Parton

2005-12-06T12:37:00.000-05:00

Clown Coffee holds up a picture of Dolly Parton.

Clown Coffee: I'd like to wake up next to her one morning.
Worker #3116: You'd like to wake up as her one morning.
Clown Coffee: Yeah.

Floats Like a Butterfly, Stings Like a Jackass

2005-12-06T10:36:00.000-05:00

"According to our sources, Federline and 'an entourage' danced away until 4:30 a.m. at Tao while Mike Tyson and Joy Bryant looked on."
(New York Post)

I really like this construction, which is particular to gossip pages. While it is intended simply to point out that Mike Tyson and Joy Bryant were in the same club as Kevin Federline and his friends but that they were not dancing, I like to take it literally. I like to imagine Mike Tyson enraptured, barely even touching his drink as he watches the hypnotic gyrations of the lithe and fit Federline, who I am assuming was wearing a wife beater and a doo-rag.

The War on Christmas: Operation Kill the Kranks

2005-12-06T10:06:00.000-05:00

Ads Portray Nominee as Protector of Christmas
(New York Times)

I'm very excited about the War on Christmas. It got off to a pretty good start last year, which is why you haven't really heard much about the holiday yet. Usually after Thanksgiving you hear a lot about Christmas, but not since me and the rest of the Jews started waging our successful war against it. And you know what? This year Christmas is going down.

While I'm certainly not offended by the Christmasification of, say, Hot Topic, I don't really understand the need to have a giant creche in front of the courthouse. Is that the cradle of the holiday spirit? You're like, "Boy, it sucks that I got that DUI, but look! The manger!" And while the whole War on Christmas is obviously a craven political tactic dreamt up by an amoral group of EXTREME LEFT WING LIBERALS to make the conservative base look bad, my real problem with it is that it just makes me wish there really was a War on Christmas. Like a war War. Like Iraq. I wish there was an anti-Christmas Abu Ghraib.

I like this part of the article:

"'Liberal groups like People for the American Way and the A.C.L.U. have opposed public Christmas and Hanukkah displays and even fought to keep Christmas carols out of school,' declares a radio commercial paid for by the conservative Committee for Justice beginning Monday in Colorado, Wisconsin and West Virginia, states whose senators are considered pivotal votes on Judge Alito."

Right. Everyone's going to be real upset if they don't get to see some crooked menorah in the corner of some building. That's another thing: I HATE the shabby attempts at equalizing holiday recognition. Like some kunta cloth tapestry for a doormat and a dreidel hanging from a string. What is that? All the Jews are like, "Oh, man, finally the Jews is equal! L'chaim!" That's like when your mom made you invite that smelly fat kid to your birthday party. Was the fact that everyone ignored him except to call him Pig Fart really less upsetting than if he just hadn't gotten the invitation he didn't expect to get anyway?

Here is my other favorite part from the article:

"Some of the groups supporting Judge Alito are also turning up the heat on retailers. In a shift from previous years, the American Family Association, one of the groups, is organizing phone and e-mail campaigns against several retail chains for omitting explicit references to Christmas from their store displays or holiday fliers. The group has specifically urged a boycott of Target stores, accusing them of repeatedly using the word 'holiday' instead."

This is funny in the way Freedom Fries was funny, but I also like it because these people are buying their Christmas gifts at Target so I guess God already fucked them by making them poor.

Why? What Do You Get in the Mail That's So Great?!

2005-12-06T09:26:00.000-05:00

You Can Jake My Gyllenhaal Anyday

2005-12-05T16:08:00.000-05:00

I enjoy a little challenge, so I don't like it when it's super obvious what the porno-remake of a movie is going to be called. Yeah, I'm talking to you, Bareback Mountin'!

Hi, 1998 Called, They Want Their MTV News Back

2005-12-05T15:21:00.000-05:00

(news.yahoo.com)

L'il Kim: 0
Foxy Brown: -1

I'm very excited about how Foxy Brown and L'il Kim continue to battle each other long after either of them mattered. Biggie dead, bitches! First, there are their competing dance-hall singles (Kim's "Put Ya Lighters Up" v. Brown's "Come Fly with Me"), and their competing legal troubles (Kim's perjury trial v. Brown's assault trial) and what is certain to become some kind of street-level disability battle. Kim will roll up in her BKLYN Stephen Hawking chair be like "Fuck Foxy Brown, she may be deaf, but I have lost all feeling in the left side of my body! And I color blind! Top that top that!" Then it's all whirrrrrrrrr back to Bed-Stuy.

R.I.P. Dakota Joel Osment

2005-12-05T11:42:00.000-05:00

Seriously, though, War of the Worlds? Talk about a punch in the eye!

I liked the part when SPOILERS ALERT the surly My Chemical Romance teenager decided that he wanted to battle the aliens for the love of country, because, you know, all it takes is a global crisis to spur those lazybones into black-eyelinered action. I also liked how the aliens were a vastly superior race but their robots still needed halogen lamps to see their way in the dark with what McCullen referred to as their "ten megapixel eyes." I also liked the part in my imagination when Dakota Fanning got what she deserved and was sucked into an alien uterus out of that cookie cage and turned into blood fertilizer for the alien fields. Dakota Fanning: the female equivalent of Haley Joel Osment. I liked the part when Haley Joel Osment happened to be in that same cookie cage and was also sucked into the alien uterus out of that cookie cage and turned into blood fertilizer for the alien fields. But my absolute favorite part of the whole movie was when the aliens got a cold and died because there's nothing like a biological deus ex machina to get a writer's lazy ass out of narrative trouble. I've never actually read the H.G. Wells original, but if that was how he ended it then there are over a hundred years of "what the fuck?"s coming his way.* Oh, and a special message to Morgan Freeman: you can stop narrating everything now.

* I just looked it up. That's EXACTLY how Wells ended the original. May the WTFs BEGIN!

The First Rule of Handcuffs Club is You Talk About Handcuffs Club

2005-12-05T09:07:00.000-05:00

Just because I don't write in my diary on the weekend doesn't mean that I'm not working hard on it. Every event is scoured for potential, and then there's the added bonus of I have to remember that shit two days later. Luckily, the most frequently pondered question of "Would sitting on the couch with nothing to do make a hilarious entry?" is both easily answered, and easily drawn to recall later.

Anyway, watching the intellectual poverty that is War of the Worlds on Friday seemed like a prime subject for diarying. There were just so many awful things about that movie, I figured "Hey, Monday morning, BOOM! instant diary entry!" But for as much adventure and excitement as Mr. Spielberg tried to pack into WotW, it still did not have the visceral rush and diary-ready material of being IN A FIGHT AND GETTING HANDCUFFED BY THE POLICE.

I don't remember a lot of it, just the part where we left the party and the drunk guy came off of his porch and yelled at me for scraping ice off my car, and then me telling him that we were leaving and wouldn't be making any more noise, and him saying never to come back, and McCullen saying that we would come back tomorrow, and him punching McCullen in the eye, and then me pinning him against a car, and then pinning him against the ground, and then pinning him against the car again, and then THROWING him on the ground, and then him punching me in my face right when the cops arrived. Then it was SUPERHANDCUFFSTIME! It all got sorted out, I guess, and neither McCullen nor I decided to press charges. But here are my two favorite things that the cops said in the aftermath:

"Do you want us to tell this guy he is an asshole?"

and the best:

"Your wish is our command."

But more importantly, LINDSAY LOHAN AND 50 CENT!!!? This is even worser and grosser than that whole Bruce Willis fiasco!!!! Although now that I think of it, I guess 50 Cent kind of is the black Bruce Willis?!!?!?!?!?!

Further Off the Deep-End into Tragedy and Loneliness

2005-12-02T15:02:00.000-05:00

This is the one where I take Trustkill Records' description of crap-metal band Bleeding Through's new album, "The Truth," and replace all references to the band and their album with references to me and my gay on-line diary, because this is how I would like to be thought of:

The pain, frustration, and despair of the preyed upon and forgotten have been fashioned into a sharpened point on Worker #3116's landmark new gay on-line diary, "Corporate Casual." Skeletons come forth from the closet, secrets are revealed, and broken promises arise from dirtied earth.

Faster yet more melodic, heavier yet more accomplished, more precise while even further off the deep-end into tragedy and loneliness, Worker #3116's gay on-line diary is a trend-proof middle finger toward the glut of over-saturation that threatens to destroy a scene this diarist helped to build.

"Corporate Casual" is Worker #3116's defining gay on-line diary. Stripped to his core, laid bare, like the artwork suggests -- putting everything on the table with such naked honesty and painful catharsis his body threatened to fall apart from the weight of the boiling passion he's laid to record.

There are leaders and there are followers. When all of the so-called movements in underground gay on-line diaries catching the "buzz" right now are over, expect to see Worker #3116 standing tall, with integrity, honor, and spirit intact. To the victor the spoils!

Tit Wrench

2005-12-02T13:51:00.000-05:00

Clown Coffee: Have you heard of a band called Tit Wrench?
Worker #3116: No. Sounds dumb. Sounds like something you'd like.
Clown Coffee: Sounds like something you'd be in.
Worker #3116: ...
Clown Coffee: If you had any talent.
Worker #3116: That doesn't make any sense, on a number of levels.
Clown Coffee: Only takes one.
Worker #3116: To not make sense?
Clown Coffee: Yeah.
Worker #3116: ...
Clown Coffee: And then I'm in the clear.
Worker #3116: ...

Futurebest-Seller

2005-12-02T13:11:00.000-05:00

Excerpted from a book Worker #3116 is writing that involves capoeira, the dance-like Brazilian martial art.

"Outside of the roda [capoeira fighting ring], it shouldn’t be too hard to befriend the capoeiristas [practitioners of capoeira], but know what you are getting in to. Are your friends a bunch of silly hippies who like to go to the park with their devil sticks and their drum circles and talk about how awesome it is when girls menstruate? This is basically that, but with play fighting. And muscles."

Newsflash: Kurt Cobain Still Dead

2005-12-02T10:18:00.000-05:00

Last night I seen Gus Van Sant's Last Days. I liked it, but I'm watching it and there's this scene where a friend of Blake (Kurt-Cobain-alike) is driving a private detective up to the house (based on the real live private detective, Tom Grant, who was hired during the last few days of Cobain's life to find the AWOL drug-addled star) and I'm like "wait a second, Ricky Jay?" Yes, Ricky Jay, the legendary illusionist and historian of all things magical.

Then later, Blake walks into town and ends up in this rock club and a kid comes up and starts talking to him, mostly being drowned out by the band (Ha ha, Gus, always with the visual-auditory pranks! How very Roman Polanski of you. Or perhaps it's more early-neo-realist-Antonioni, before he got into all that abstract Marxist shit about labor, I don't know!) and I'm like "wait a second, Harmony Korine?" Yes, Harmony Korine, the legendary dick slit behind Kids, Gummo, and Julien Donkey Boy.

So, pretending that this was a documentary about Kurt Cobain, I started to imagine a very different final chapter in his life in which he actually encountered Ricky Jay and Harmony Korine. Ricky Jay was all like, "Behold, as I pierce the skin of a watermelon with this normal playing card, and then make that same card disappear, only to make it reappear inside of JFK's casket in Arlington Cemetery, over 2,500 miles away!" And then later Cobain ran into Harmony Korine who was all like, "I want you to hit this crack pipe and blow the smoke into this black AIDS baby's ass and I'm going to film the whole thing from this hidden video camera disguised as my autistic deaf grandma's prosthetic hand." And Cobain was all like, "POW! SHOTGUN IN MY MOUF!"

Oh, and Gus, this is your third film in a row that features long tracking shots from behind of people walking.

1. Gerry
2. Elephant
3. Last Days

WE GET IT! Film is always trying to keep up with real life, but never quite makes it...and with film as a guide the viewer is stuck with an incomplete view of what truly makes a human being human, which, in fact, may be completely unknowable and outside the boundaries of art. But you know what else we get? BORED!

Also, my important research continues:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/scientology
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/turducken
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AIDS
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurt_Cobain

Pumping Iron Supplements

2005-12-02T09:37:00.000-05:00

Yesterday was AIDS Day, but it was also Old Men Talk to Worker #3116 at the Gym Day.

First there was the old man in the plaid shirt tucked into his chest-high brown polyester pants with those giant drug-store pharmacy sunglasses on:

Worker #3116: Do you need to use this [incline sit-up bench]?
Old Man 1: Oh no! I am 90 years old, so I get more than I need from that [isolated pull ab machine] over there.
Worker #3116: I bet. But that's great!
Old Man 1: Yeah. Thank you.

[Worker #3116 continues his work-out. Two minutes later Old Man 1 returns.]

Old Man 1: Most of my friends have passed away, much less are still coming to the gym.
Worker #3116: Yeah...it's amazing.

[Old Man 1 walks away, continuing to talk.]

Old Man 1: Yep. But what's the saying...I guess that's the way the cookie crumbles. What's the saying?

Yes, the way the cookie crumbles is that all your loved ones die and then it's AB-TIME TO THE MAX!

Then there was Old Man 2, who was a little bit more put together than Old Man 1 because he was only 89.

Old Man 2: How many push-ups do you do?
Worker #3116: 150.
Old Man 2: 1,000?
Worker #3116: No. 150.
Old Man 2: On my aircraft carrier, where I was stationed during The War, there was a fella who won the [some award known only to the people on his aircraft carrier during The War] for the most push-ups. He could do 500.
Worker #3116: Without stopping?
Old Man 2: Without stopping. Just pumping them out.
Worker #3116: Ech. That is too many push-ups.
Old Man 2: He must have eaten his Wheaties.

Wheaties is how the Nazis were defeated.

Gremlins=AIDS!

2005-12-01T13:46:00.000-05:00

If there is any one movie that I think best crystallizes the AIDS crisis in metaphorical terms, it would have to be Gremlins. Think about it:

1. Mogwai become gremlins if they are fed after midnight.
Unprotected sex often occurs after midnight, and probably so does a lot of intravenous drug-use using someone else's works!

2. Mogwai and gremlins multiply if you get them wet.
The AIDS virus multiplies in the blood-stream, which is wet!

3. Sunlight kills mogwai and gremlins.
AIDS cannot exist for any extended period of time outside the human body, i.e. in the sunlight!

4. Gremlins are green.
Green monkeys!

If you are to extend the metaphor to its logical conclusion, you would discover that mogwai represent the good kind of AIDS, while Stripe and his gang is regular, or bad, AIDS. And the scene in the swimming pool is Africa.

Wikid

2005-12-01T13:00:00.000-05:00

If you were to type wikipedia into my browser's address field, it would give you these three options from my internet history cache:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/scientology
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/turducken
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AIDS

CelebrAIDSs Good Times!

2005-12-01T12:46:00.000-05:00

Q: How many AIDS does it take to screw in a light-bulb?
A: None, that's why jokes about AIDS Day are so dark!